Angela Beesley has a one-sentence apologia for Ryan on her blog, followed by "I'll miss you, Ryan." There's a place for comments! Angela had dinner with Ryan and the cabal in San Francisco. Next to Jimbo and Gil, she probably knows as much about who knew what, and when they knew it, as anybody at Wikia. Send her a comment about how she should have the courage to describe what happened, so that all of us are in a better position to make recommendations for increased accountability at Wikipedia.

In a blink, the wisdom of the crowd became the fury of the crowd. In the last few days, contributors to Wikipedia, the popular online encyclopedia, have turned against one of their own who was found to have created an elaborate false identity.

Under the name Essjay, the contributor edited thousands of Wikipedia articles and was once one of the few people with the authority to deal with vandalism and to arbitrate disputes between authors.

To the Wikipedia world, Essjay was a tenured professor of religion at a private university with expertise in canon law, according to his user profile. But in fact, Essjay is a 24-year-old named Ryan Jordan, who attended a number of colleges in Kentucky and lives outside Louisville.

Mr. Jordan’s deception came to public attention last Monday when The New Yorker published a rare editors’ note saying that when it wrote about Essjay as part of a lengthy profile of Wikipedia, “neither we nor Wikipedia knew Essjay’s real name,” and that it took Essjay’s credentials and life experience at face value.

...

After the article appeared, a reader contacted The New Yorker about Essjay’s real identity, which Mr. Jordan had disclosed with little fanfare when he recently accepted a job at Wikia, a for-profit company.

In an e-mail message on Friday, The New Yorker’s deputy editor, Pamela Maffei McCarthy, said: “We were comfortable with the material we got from Essjay because of Wikipedia’s confirmation of his work and their endorsement of him. In retrospect, we should have let our readers know that we had been unable to corroborate Essjay’s identity beyond what he told us.”

The New Yorker editors’ note ended with a defiant comment from Jimmy Wales, a founder of Wikipedia and the dominant force behind the site’s growth. “I regard it as a pseudonym and I don’t really have a problem with it,” he said of Mr. Jordan’s alter ego.

The NYT story should help a lot. I was worried that this story might stay stuck in the blogosphere. But once the NYT publishes anything, it's officially okay for any reporter on the planet to treat it as worthy of his time and his publication. I put all the history links I have on this story in a box at the top of the home page at wikipedia-watch.org under the title, "The Essjay Evidence."

http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/86203(One of the most prominent German speaking computer magazines. Their coverage is quite complete though some important facts are missing e.g. Essjay's use of his false academic titles to grade up in article discussions)

Mainstream media will jump in tomorrow, I guess. They tend to give a lot of credit to the Wikipedia project, after all we didn't have a Seigenthaler disaster on de.wikipedia.org till now...

Oh, one more link from Austria I found mentioning Essjay, dated 08/26/06:http://www.wienerzeitung.at/DesktopDefault...=wzo&cob=245440Nicely written article explaining pro's and con's of the Wikipedia project in general. Contributing to WP may become an obsession, they say. "Or how would you explain otherwise one Dr. Essjay (a pseudonym), a professor teaching theology at an US college, spending 14 hours per day on his computer, writing or editing 16,000 WP articles since February 05?"

Could you pin the current AFDs, RFCs, and DRV-by-Shoutings to the dynamic list? What with all the name changes from Ryan Jordan to Essjay, Midnite Deletions, and All-Round Floating Crap Game going on, I can hardly keep a breast of the boobarama, and I think we all know how upsetting that can be.

The NYT story should help a lot. I was worried that this story might stay stuck in the blogosphere. But once the NYT publishes anything, it's officially okay for any reporter on the planet to treat it as worthy of his time and his publication. I put all the history links I have on this story in a box at the top of the home page at wikipedia-watch.org under the title, "The Essjay Evidence."

I cannot wait for "What Did Jimmy Know, and When Did He Know It?".

So far, his versions of events are curious (yes, the use of plural "versions" was intentional). Similar to what I endured with him in September and October.

Make the appropriate correction here -- "for the record" -- and we'll alert the media.

Well, I do have an account there... I mean, I'm fine with the idea of Daniel getting the credit and all, and someone would have found it sooner or later regardless, but... oh, why not! You only live once! (Or twice, if you're James Bond.)

Somey, I didn't tell Andrew that, and he didn't ask me that. On wikipedia-watch.org, in the box at the top, I am careful to give credit to "researchers" at wikipediareview.com. I even link to this site.

But look at it this way -- you need to "out" yourself and use your real name. No reporter will feel comfortable saying that "Somey, an anonymous user, found the new bio on wikia.com." So while I readily admit that you deserve the credit for finding the new bio on wikia.com, it's a lot more difficult for me to insist that a reporter give you the credit. And that's because you don't use your real name.

If I'm asked, I have to say "researchers at wikipediareview.com" found it. But I haven't been asked.

You have to admit, though, that I was a lot quicker to recognize that you stumbled across a smoking gun than you were, and that I acted on it, and you might not have acted on it if I hadn't noticed your post.

Andrew and I go back several years. We started with Google-bashing. He just assumed that I found the smoking gun. I had put about ten hours into Essjay research prior to your discovery, hours that turned up nothing. But at least I was able to smell smoke instantly when I saw Essjay's new bio, and I don't think your reaction to it was all that strong.

We need more people on this board who use their real names. Then we can talk about giving credit when it's due.

But look at it this way -- you need to "out" yourself and use your real name. No reporter will feel comfortable saying that "Somey, an anonymous user, found the new bio on wikia.com."

Hmm... How about if I reveal my super-secret identity once it's clear they've deleted that article about you on WP once and for all? Maybe that will give them some incentive to actually do it this time...

QUOTE

You have to admit, though, that I was a lot quicker to recognize that you stumbled across a smoking gun than you were, and that I acted on it...

That's true, of course. To be honest, I didn't want to believe Essjay was doing what it looked like he was doing. Since he was a Wikia staffer, I actually would have preferred not to make so much trouble for him - I sort of thought it might cause a lot of problems for Uncyclopedia, for some reason. Not sure why I thought that... But then he had to go and ruin it all by claiming he was "protecting himself" against "trolls and stalkers," which as we all know is just their code-phrase for, well, us.

Anyway, I'll talk to the S.O. about it - she's been against the idea since Day One, though. And there are some colleagues at work to consider, too. Also, I'm worried that the little girl who feeds me will also stop cleaning out my habitat if she finds out.

On Wikia's site, Jordan said he lives outside Louisville and studied philosophy and religion at Centre, in Danville, as well as the University of Kentucky and University of Louisville.

He said that before coming to Wikia, "I was an account manager with a Fortune 20 company, where I worked on a ten person team that managed roughly $500,000,000 in annual sales. Prior to that, I was a paralegal for five years," including "nearly a year with a firm in Louisville that represented doctors in medical licensure matter and a three month special position with a United States Bankruptcy Trustee."

A Centre spokesman confirmed Jordan attended from 2001 to 2003, and a UK spokesman said he was enrolled in the fall semester of 2003 at the former Lexington Community College, now Bluegrass Community and Technical College.

A spokeswoman for U of L said nobody by that name has attended the university since 1920, and a spokeswoman for the U.S. bankruptcy trustee said the office had no record Jordan had worked there.

J. Fox DeMoisey, a lawyer who represents doctors in licensure cases, said Jordan had worked in his office for about six months as a secretary and receptionist.